Anne Yarwood

Consider the affirmation ‘You may encounter many defeats but you must not be defeated’ – Maya Angelou.

And the following statements:- ‘Britain has a social mobility problem which is getting worse for an entire generation of young people’… particularly for white working-class boys.  Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission  (SMCP ) State of the Nation Report 16/11/16 – Chair Alan Milburn.

Runnymede Trust report-  Who Cares about the White Working Class?

‘The Plight is constructed by the media, politicians, anti-immigration groups as the fault of immigrant minority ethnic groups or the cultural deficit of the under class, or both, while leaving the hierarchical and highly stratified nature of British society, out of the equation’.

Interesting resources: – ‘RESPECTABLE’  a novel by LYNSEY HANLEY.

 Richard Hoggart ‘THE USES OF LITERACY’ 1957 but relevant.

kirstywalker@education.co.uk  020 7227 5371 Social Mobility Commission.

Runneymede Trust – www.runneymedetrust.org

Chatting to strangers was what you did in my war-time childhood. Sitting on those side seats downstairs on the bus, squashed between women (my size !!) with covered punnets full of yellow downy chicks. Off to Kidderminster market. Or dispatched to stand in queues outside the Tripe shop, basket on arm. Learnt much in queues !

The other day I chatted with Ben in our garden. Admired the TATTOOS during his tea break from tree lopping. “Left school early. Nothing to teach me !” He lived on a barge. ” You could call me a Wild Man” he said. “Number of wild animals lived with me….now help out with conservation stuff. Teach kids.”  “What’s the tattoo about?” sez I. “Pride in myself.. my body” said Ben.

The other day a HERON , today a RED KITE.

It swooped, skimmed the Magnolia, past the Oak, chasing a Crow.

Wing span 6ft, held at a dihedral with a long forked tail, twisting as it changed direction. I was taken over; an invasion of majesty. Down it swooped again, right up to the kitchen window. Orange spread of its tail feathers ..orange cream brown for my mind’s eye.

Enthralled, my conversation with ticket agency ( booking tickets for Justin Butcher’s performance locally of THE DEVIL’S PASSION) got a bit confusing. Credit card number being given interspersed with “Oh! Here it comes again. It’s HUGE”   www.redkite.net  (Pix copyright Helen Olive)

This year we celebrate the 25th anniversary of THE QUIET GARDEN MOVEMENT’s foundation. Arising from the INSPIRATIONAL IMAGINATION of our dearly loved Revd. Philip Roderick, there are now 300 Quiet Gardens around the world. 

In our garden, a group has met every month for these 25 years.

6 of us reflected on what these meets mean to us:- 

Practise putting words to tentative reformulation of own spirituality: Being space: Coming aware of the awe and wonder of creation: I bring people and it’s not for them: The group is very open at a deep level.. this relates to it being an established group: Need to feel comfortable to be open: A place where you can take time in silence to be challenged: Every now and then I see myself as member of the human species, not just a single being: The universe being conscious of itself…Go away refreshed. www.quietgarden.org

For the past 50 years, we’ve hosted PLAY READING groups. First in Malaysia, introduced to companionable, self expanding evenings by Oliver Baudert: an inspirational actor, living now in Australia. In the present clime of funding threats to libraries, the counter-force of delight in language and ACTING thrives in such small committed groups, in local AmDram, and go-watch National Theatre productions at our local cinemas. Our heroes are listed in “500 Power People”.. Mark Rylance, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Judy Dench, Kenneth Branagh….. Countless community groups act out the CHALLENGES of the times, using car parks, any old hall, on the South Bank..on the streets.

Crafting life drama with WIT, WISDOM , WONDERFUL WONDERFUL WORDS.

It lies 3 thousand light years from Earth across inter-stellar space. It is the brief glorious phase in the life of a Sun-like  star. The truly cosmic ‘eye’ is over half a Light Year across.

Of course astronomers may well be seeing the destiny of our Sun when they view this image.

Our sun is destined to enter its own planetary nebula phase of evolution in about 5 billion years.

A light year is the distance that light travels in one year and is 186,000 miles per second x 3,600 x 24 x 365 miles in a year.
http://www.star.ucl.ac.uk/~apod/apod/astropix.html

Went to hairdressers today. Ken aged 70, works independently at a salon in a local Elderly Care Home. There were four women awaiting Ken’s skilled attention. Three of us had a little sing- song. ” Jesus wants you for a sunbeam ” Sunday school and Salvation Army ditties from our childhood. We all emerged ..coifed grey curls. Ken in considerable arthritic pain, working steadily through the queue. I was TOUCHED by Ken’s devotion to re-create head-strong  dignity, for us women.

In a crowded space, just a few of us started to Belly Dance. Tina danced. Tina lent us gloriously jangly wraps. ( I bought a purple one, laden with tin coins) , Tina played music . Laughing so happily, we shoved unsupple bodies into undulations !!!!              ‘And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane, by those who could not hear the music’ –  Nietzsche

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

– Wendell Berry (http://dallasegrets.org/?page_id=122)